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Chapter IV.<br />

LEEDS UNDER THE NORMANS.<br />

HE Normans wouldfind Leeds a meanvillage<br />

composed of but about three lanes or streets,<br />

possibly Briggate, Kirkgate, and Swinegate,<br />

inhabited by some threehundred villains,who<br />

were governed by seven thanes or esquires,<br />

who held the seven manors into which "Leedes"<br />

was divided. The town was granted to Ilbert<br />

de Laci as onemanor at the Conquest, and by that great<br />

warriorit was bestowed,probablyat some period previous<br />

to 1089, upon Ralph Paganell,for we find him in that<br />

year presenting the Church of Leeds and the Chapel of<br />

Holbeck to the Priory of York. Probably the Castle was<br />

built by the Paganellfamily to maintain their authority.<br />

That after the ConquestLeeds began to assume a more<br />

important characteris evident. There is in existence a<br />

charter granted to the burgesses of Leeds by Maurice<br />

Paganell, the lord of the manor, in the reign of King<br />

John. This charter, written in the rudest and most<br />

undecipherableLatin, has been made intelligible by the<br />

learningand labourofDr. Whitaker; and a few references<br />

to it will afford a striking picture of the state of Leeds in<br />

that good old time, and an echo offering a startling<br />

contrast to the sounds whichrise to-day from " the busy<br />

Mart; the temperate Council Board * * * the<br />

patriotic voice of ancient Leeds."

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